Always You (22 page)

If looks were daggers, Abby would have pinned Christopher to the wall like a bug in a specimen tray.

“Sorry, Mom,” Christopher said.

“I thought we were too young to set up housekeeping,” Chiara said. “I didn’t want to have to make dinner and do laundry for two people while going to college. It was enough work to take care of just myself.”

“Chiara likes having her own space,” John said. “And I’ve always respected that.”

“I don’t get it.” Abby ground the flats of her fists into the sides of her head. “Why get married and then go your separate ways?”

“We wanted to be married, Mama,” Chiara insisted. “It was our way of being together without…being together.”

“I still don’t understand why, in all these years, you never told anyone that you were married,” Abby said.

Christopher cleared his throat, to capture everyone’s attention. “I’d imagine that their elopement was a covert act of rebellion. It was John’s way of striking a blow for independence from his controlling, domineering, overly strict mother, and it was Chiara’s first adult decision free of the interfering opinions of her mother and older sisters.”

Clara, Ciel and Kyla accosted him all at once, denying any undue influence or pressure they might have subjected Chiara to over the years. Christopher, his shoulders hunched against the attack, looked to Zweli for help. But Zweli had slipped into the kitchen.

“Forgive me, Christopher,” Abby said above everyone else, “but you’re completely off the mark. There’s no logical explanation for what John and Chiara did, none at all.”

“I have one,” Cady said quietly. “It feels good to have something that’s all your own, something you don’t have to justify or explain to anyone else. I can’t think of anything more precious than true love. When you find it, you want to cherish it and hoard it and keep it all to yourself, like some kind of priceless treasure. You don’t lose anything by sharing it with other people, but other people do have a way of gettin’ all up in your business, as though your happiness belongs to them somehow, too.” Cady gazed at Chiara, and there was no mistaking the envy in her eyes. “Chiara had twelve years of glorying in her secret, with no interference from anyone else. It’s a testament to the incredible bond that she and John have always had.”

Cady’s words left the room spellbound. Until Abby broke it.

“Well, I want me a wedding,” she said saucily. “And with that baby on the way, you two had best be getting on with it.”

The room went totally silent. No one moved, other than to shift his or her wide eyes to Chiara.

“Baby?” Clara repeated, gawking at Chiara. “You’re having a baby?”

“
We’re
having a baby,” John said proudly.

Clara pressed her fingers to her forehead. “Oh God,” she moaned, her eyes darting wildly from person to person. “Our baby sister is having a baby. I remember when I used to change her diaper, and wipe applesauce from her chin. Dear Lord, I feel as if
I’m
going to be a grandmother.”

* * *

Lee was carrying a sleeping Ella’s dead weight to his car when Ciel cornered John and Chiara in the foyer. “Mama’s in the kitchen with Clara—” she started.

“Commiserating or celebrating?” Chiara asked.

“I can’t tell, but look, there’s something I didn’t tell everyone about your marriage documentation,” Ciel said as quietly as possible.

“Yeah,” John said, scuffing the toe of his shoe against the fringe of Abby’s Persian runner. “I thought you might catch that.”

“The marriage is still legal,” Chiara said. “Isn’t it?”

Ciel held her baby sister’s intent gaze. “Would it make a difference if it weren’t?”

The early days of their marriage had been fun for Chiara, if for no other reason than the one Cady had stated so plainly: Chiara had enjoyed having a secret from her mother, sisters and Grandma Claire. It wasn’t until years later, after Almadine had visited John for the first time in Chicago, that Chiara had the slightest twinge of doubt regarding her future with John.

Almadine had done all but have Chiara kidnapped and buried in a shallow grave to keep her and John apart through high school, and college had been a welcome respite from Almadine’s meddling. Getting recruited together to work at USITI had been a godsend as well, because it had meant that they could stay together. But when Almadine came to Chicago for the first time to visit John, she’d been so unpleasant that Chiara had considered leaving USITI to put some distance between herself and John. The transfer to sales and public relations had come along then, and instead of quitting, Chiara had simply switched departments. And that too, had turned out to be a good move for her and John.

Chiara had invited John on a number of her sales trips, and with absence making the heart grow fonder, each exotic locale they’d visited together had been like a mini honeymoon. Bangkok, Seoul, Jakarta, Hong Kong and Kuala Lumpur had been just a few of the cities they’d enjoyed, but Singapore had been their favorite.

Each trip had given their relationship an element of fantasy, a way of stepping out of their individual lives and uniting in very special, very unique ways. They had ridden elephants in Jakarta, had learned self-defense in Thailand, had learned to catch and clean squid in Kuala Lumpur…the world had offered them so much, and they had taken advantage of it far from Almadine’s disapproval and well-intentioned meddling from the Winters camp.

Their latest trip to Singapore in October had been so beautiful and wondrous that they’d let themselves be swept up entirely in its romance. Far from USITI, Almadine and the Winters clan, Chiara and John had created the most tangible proof of their love, a baby, which had united them more strongly than marriage ever could. Even as she retrieved the marriage certificate from her private files for Ciel’s perusal, Chiara had been unconcerned as to what the verdict would be. No matter the validity of the paper in her hand, no one could ever convince her that she and John weren’t married.

“No,” Chiara said. “It wouldn’t matter to me if the certificate isn’t legal, but for Mama’s sake I hope it passes muster. Does it?”

“I guess so, even though you lied on one of your documents,” Ciel told them. “To get a confidential marriage license in California, you have to sign a statement declaring that you’ve been living together as husband and wife,” Ciel said. “The law doesn’t state the amount of time you have to be cohabitating, but I can’t help wondering how you two pulled that off. Your driver’s licenses would have had separate addresses on them.”

“We used our school address as our residence,” Chiara said. “We were at school together more than we were in our separate houses anyway. When we got back to St. Louis, we filled out a change of address form so that the marriage certificate would be forwarded to a P.O. box we rented for three months.”

Ciel smiled. “It’s ingenious, I have to give you that. I owe you much belated congratulations.” She wrapped an arm around John and Chiara each and pulled them in for a hug. “You are going to have a real wedding now, though, aren’t you? Mama will go nuts if you don’t.”

Chiara cringed. “I really, really hate doing things that I hate just to make other people happy. I don’t like going to weddings, never mind having to throw one of my own. Yours and Clara’s were okay because I was a kid and got to drink punch and eat crap all day, but now I’ve got something to live up to. Cady’s was pure madness, with that carnival she had for her reception, and Kyla’s was crazy too, with all the paparazzi coming out to crash it. I didn’t realize what a popular personality she was until Zweli had to tackle that tabloid reporter who tried to take Kyla’s picture when she was in the bathroom at her reception. My problem is more specific to the family. I’m the last daughter. Mama knows this is her last wedding, and I know she’s going to try to steamroll me.”

“Think of it this way,” Ciel said. “You had the marriage you wanted. Just make sure that you have the wedding you want, too.”

A short, choppy laugh escaped Chiara. “You guys have never let me do anything the way I wanted to.”

“Everything’s negotiable, Chi.” Ciel winked on her way out. “Never forget that.”

Four days after his baby and his marriage were outed at Abby’s house, John was back there again to pick up Chiara to take her to George’s with him. The two of them had been trying to reach him for days, with no response by phone or e-mail. They’d been so worried about him that when he finally called to arrange a meeting, John and Chiara were more than ready to kill him.

“Where’ve you been?” John demanded angrily by way of greeting when George opened his dorm room door for them.

“On a job interview,” George said. He stood aside to let them enter.

John blinked in surprise. “Really? Wow…” He calmed a little, and Chiara put her hand over her heart in relief.

“We thought you’d been abducted and tortured, or worse,” she said. “Don’t disappear like that again, George.”

“Your timing’s a little strange, but it’s good to see that you’re thinking about life after graduation,” John said. “I was worried that you’d be one of those ten-year undergrads, or end up graduating and going to work at Starbucks.”

“Oh, I didn’t want the job,” George smiled. He removed the wide yellow clip-on tie he’d been wearing with his black button-down shirt. “I just wanted to get into the company to plant a file on one of the company hard drives. I just got back from the airport, actually, and—”

“Exactly where did you interview?” John said over his brother.

“In Phoenix, Arizona. With Vulcan Semiconducter,” George said.

John covered his mouth with his hand and stared at Chiara in disbelief.

“That’s Carlton Puel’s company.” She sank into George’s squeaky swivel chair. “George, you’re crazy.”

“The man himself interviewed me,” George said proudly, completely ignorant of John and Chiara’s distress. “He offered me a job in his fledgling programming department. Seems Mr. Puel is looking to diversify, specifically to expand into software security and encryption. He’s looking for a few good designers to create new junk for him.”

John couldn’t speak for a long moment. Chiara felt sick to her stomach. “For someone so smart,” John began, “you are incredibly stupid! Do you think Carlton Puel can’t add two and two? He sent someone after me. Do you honestly believe that he’ll think it’s a coincidence that he interviewed a Mahoney a week after he sent someone to assault a Mahoney?”

“He offered me seventy-thousand to start, plus incentives, bonuses, full benefits and use of the company ranch,” George said pitifully.

John threw off his Chesterfield and paced in what little floor space was free of George’s refuse and discarded clothing. “I don’t care if he offered you ten million dollars and Clara Winters in a mesh bodysuit, you never should have gone to Arizona! How did you even pay for your airfare?”

“I didn’t have to pay for it.” George dropped his eyes to his bright white sneakers. “It’s not unheard of for companies to foot the bill for travel expenses for people they’re very interested in hiring. Besides, I didn’t accept the position.”

“Oh, well that’s a relief,” John said sarcastically.

“Puel wanted me to cut my hair,” George said. “There’s a dress code, too. I can’t hang without my hair and my duds.”

John’s mouth hung open in disbelief. “Those are the only reasons you didn’t take the job?”

“Those, and because I’d go to jail for fraud if I was hired with the resumé I submitted.” George went to his desk. He lifted an empty can of Mountain Dew and grabbed four sheets of paper. He gave two each to John and Chiara.

“Scott Turner?” Chiara said, reading the name at the top of the first paper out loud.

“It’s my cover,” George said with a lopsided smile. He opened his wallet and pulled out an Ohio state identification card, a Social Security Card, and a student ID—with George’s picture on it—from Ohio State University.

“How did you get these?” Chiara gasped. “This is totally illegal,” she added, conveniently forgetting her own experience in fraudulent documentation.

John looked up from the second of the two sheets of paper George had given him. “This transcript says that Scott Turner is a straight-A student at the Russ College of Engineering and Technology at Ohio State University.”

Chiara studied her own copy. “He’s fluent in Spanish, Japanese and Xhosa?” She looked at George in curiosity. “Xhosa?”

“It’s a Bantu language,” George grinned. “I figured it would make Scott more cosmopolitan, more well rounded.”

“Borrowing his identity could get him hurt, or even killed,” John said stridently. “Carlton Puel is a dangerous man.”

“Scott Turner is me, John,” George explained. “He’s totally made up. If you search for him on the Internet, you’ll see this resumé posted with online job sites, but that’s the only evidence of this Scott Turner you’ll find.” He pointed to his fake driver’s license. “Scott Turner isn’t as common a name as John Smith, but it’s common enough to confound anyone who might try to search for more background online.”

“All Vulcan has to do is contact Ohio State to find out if Scott Turner is a student there,” John argued.

“He is,” George chuckled. “I hacked into admissions and enrolled him. It only took about ten minutes to get in.”

“Chess Club, Biology Club, Cross Country Team,
Computer Science Review
editor,” Chiara said, reading off Turner’s list of school activities. “He keeps busy.”

“Plus he’s got a 3.7 GPA,” George said. “Puel’s human resources manager e-mailed me the same day I posted the resumé online.”

“Your phone number is a 314 exchange,” John said. “That might have tipped someone off that you didn’t come from Ohio.”

“Scott Turner has his own toll-free number specifically to field calls from potential employers. He’s taking his post-graduation job search very seriously. He’s very professional.”

Chiara left the chair to give George a peck on the lips. “He’s very clever, too.”

“Don’t praise him,” John chastised. “George, did you actually plant a file at Vulcan?”

“Yep.” George went to his computer and called up the file he’d programmed specially for Vulcan. “I did it before I even got there. I overnighted a disc with the Scott Turner resumé and references files on it. The references file is the one I needed Vulcan to download. As soon as human resources opened it, I was in. All I have to do now is wait.”

“For what?” George asked.

“For the file to open a backdoor into Vulcan’s e-mail system. It should happen soon, if not already.”

“What activates the back door?” Chiara asked him.

“Human resources has to log on to its e-mail account and forward twenty of its messages to Carlton Puel. The Scott Turner resumé was obviously forwarded, so that started the countdown. After number twenty, I should be able to hack into Puel’s e-mail. I’ll be able to find out who he’s communicating with and what he talks about.”

Even though Chiara was impressed with George’s abilities, one question still bothered her. “Why did you go there in person? The Scott Turner files did all the work for you.”

George’s satisfied smile melted. For the first time, Chiara saw him as an adult, and not the laidback, silly student he usually was. “I wanted to see the man who hurt you,” he said, encompassing Chiara and John in his gaze. “I wanted to see the bastard we’re going to put in jail.”

* * *

For the next week, Chiara anxiously awaited news of George’s success or possible discovery. Though she felt safer knowing that John Doe wasn’t likely to come after her again following his arrest, she wasn’t so sure that Puel wouldn’t send someone else, so she remained at home behind closed doors unless her mother or one of her sisters could accompany her where she wanted to go. Even as she valued the safety in numbers her sisters offered, she hated that old familiar feeling of being babysat.

When Cady invited her to go shopping in The Loop early Saturday, Chiara accepted if for no other reason than to take her mind off the wait for George’s plan to take effect. Clara, Danielle, Ciel, Abigail, Ella and Kyla were already piled in the black Honda Pilot when Cady pulled the roomy vehicle up to the curb in front of Abby’s house. Once Chiara climbed in, bundling her brushed Alpaca bat-wing cape around her, Cady sped off, barely giving Chiara time to close the door.

“Thanks,” Chiara said, turning to see if Abby was on her heels. “Mama’s gone crazy lately. Every time I turn around, she’s shoving a bridal or baby magazine under my nose. She wanted to buy me this horrible wedding dress she saw in
Modern Bride
. It was a floor-length, peau de soie monstrosity with skinny straps and no back. The skirt flared about a mile and had two big pleats in the front. The worst part was this big old pink bow in the back with tails as long as the train.”

“It actually sounds kind of pretty,” Ciel said.

“Mama’s just excited,” Clara said, turning in the front passenger seat to look at Chiara. “She always makes a fuss over you.”

“You’re the baby,” Kyla teased with a roll of her dark eyes. “You give Mama all of her lasts, so she takes more of an interest in them.”

“I give her all of her what?” Chiara asked.

“You were her last baby,” Clara said.

“Yours was her last high school graduation,” Ciel added.

“Yours was her last college graduation,” Kyla threw in.

“And yours was supposed to be her last walk down the aisle to hand you off to John Mahoney,” Cady said. “You stole that from her.”

“The only thing I stole was my free will,” Chiara said. She propped her elbow against the window and slumped in her seat. “If anything, I stole it back.”

“I get to give you all your firsts, right, Mom?” Danielle asked, tearing her attention from the hand-held video game with which her cousins entertained themselves. “Your first baby, your first diaper changes, your first potty-training, your first teaching the baby how to walk…” Danielle’s long, brown sugar tresses swayed from side to side as she swung her head with her litany of firsts.

“Actually,” Clara began, “Chiara gave me all my firsts. I was in the sixth grade when she came along, and your grandpa had just died. I was Grandma Abby’s big helper.”

“Like Troy was when I was a baby?” Danielle asked.

“Oh, hell no,” Clara laughed, her raisin eyes sparkling. “Troy was no kind of help when you were born. Every time I had to change your diaper, he disappeared. One time, I asked him to bring me a onesie for you, and he went to my purse and brought me a dollar bill.”

“Boys are useless when it comes to babies,” Abigail muttered from the farthest back seat without looking up from her game.

“I changed Chiara’s diapers and gave her bottles when Mama was at work,” Clara recalled.

“Which was all the time,” Cady said. “Clara was a good big sister, Danielle. She practically had four little girls of her own by the time she was twelve.”

“It got a lot easier when your Great-Grandma Claire and Great-Grandpa Hank came to live with us,” Clara said.

“Nana Claire was the best,” Danielle said fondly, tears shining in her eyes. Five years after Claire’s death, and Chiara was amazed at how sharp and fresh the pain of loss still was for all of them.

“I think you need to make a left turn here to get off Skinker,” Ciel said, gracefully changing the subject. “Forest Park Parkway is closed off at the intersection.”

Chiara sat up straighter to see orange pylons blocking part of the intersection. “How long has the parkway been closed?”

“Too long.” Cady made the turn, but then suddenly veered right, circumventing the pylons and making her own shortcut to continue along Skinker.

The construction on Forest Park Parkway was just about the only thing that had changed about St. Louis. When she was younger, Chiara had derived a certain comfort in the unrelenting sameness of the city. She could go away for a year and come back to find everything exactly as she’d left it. But after discovering so much more about other parts of the world, coming back to St. Louis made her feel as though she were being kenneled while the rest of the world moved on without her.

Common sense told her that the situation wasn’t permanent, that her options would broaden once she’d dealt with Emmitt Grayson. She didn’t think it would take much convincing to get John to pursue employment outside St. Louis, possibly even outside the United States. And she had no qualms about rearing her child elsewhere.

She smiled to herself as they neared the corner of Delmar and Skinker, and Cady flashed her left turn signal.
Maybe I should tell Mama that we’re going to move,
she thought.
It would certainly distract her from pestering me about a wedding.

All Cady’s years of Boston living went into action once more as she zipped across the path of an oncoming Ford Excursion to make her left. “Too slow, Romeo!” she called happily, cruising along Delmar.

Chiara was pleasantly surprised to see that even though some of the stores she’d always liked in he Loop were gone, they had been replaced by boutiques that looked just as eclectic and unique as the old ones. “Can we stop there?” Chiara asked, noticing a colorfully wild storefront display filled with Afrocentric clothing.

“Soul Hippi?” Danielle said, smiling. “That’s a funny name.”

“Soul Hippi,” Ella echoed from the seat beside Abigail. “Sooouul Hippi.”

“Knock it off, Ella,” Ciel warned. “Don’t start.”

“Don’t start what?” Cady asked as she attempted to reverse parallel park her car between an old VW Bug and a glitzy black Porsche Cayman.

“Ella will latch onto some word and repeat it until we’re all ready to choke her,” Ciel said. “Yesterday it was ‘coconut.’ ”

“She said coconut for about a hundred hours yesterday,” Abigail complained as she locked her game in its boxy little case. “Dad asked her what she wanted to wear, and she goes, ‘Coconut, coconut, coconut,’ like that makes any kind of sense.”

“Is that true, Ella?” Chiara asked, grinning.

“Soul Hippi, Soul Hippi,” Ella answered merrily.

“Girl…” Ciel warned.

“Soul Hippi,” Ella mouthed.

“Cady,” Kyla said warily, “you might want to drive around and find another parking spot. I don’t think you have room here.”

“I have room,” Cady insisted, turning in her seat to better aim the car. “This is the zen of parking. If I believe I’ll fit, I’ll fit.”